Jar of Hearts
by Insideavoice
Summary: "I can't take one more step towards you. 'Cause all that's waiting is regret. And don't you know I'm not your ghost anymore? You lost the love I loved the most." Clare. Fitz. Eli. Inspired by the promo.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's note: Inspired by the promos for February and Christina Perri's song "Jar of Hearts." Will most likely include just a few short chapters involving flashbacks.**

**IMPORTANT: ****If Clare and Fitz started dating before Eli came on the scene & Vegas Night didn't happen like everyone thought it did...**

_I learned to live half a life_

Clare glanced at the clock in the kitchen. It read 7:22. Dolefully, she let out a sigh. Without ceasing, the rain hadn't let up since she got home from school today. It seemed only fitting, she supposed. After all, the thunder was just another reminder of the anniversary of the day _he_ waltzed into her life.

Clare shook her head to herself, an attempt to rid all thoughts of him from her mind. Absently, she opened the refrigerator, wondering when her mother would return home with the groceries she supposedly went out to get an hour ago.

She blew out a breath and muttered a "Finally," when the phone rang, thinking it to be her mom, apologizing profusely for being late and telling her she was just on her way home now.

"Hello?" She shut the refrigerator door and wandered barefoot into the living room.

"Clare?"

Gently, she fell on the couch and blinked, surprised. "Eli?" She lay on her back and crossed her ankles in the air, a reluctant smirk appearing. "Have a question on the English assignment?"

Eli gave a small laugh. "Nah… I was just wondering…"

Clare's eyebrows shot up. "Yes, Goldsworthy?" It wasn't often she heard him hesitant and… was that a nervous quality she detected in his tone?

Eli coughed. "I was just wondering… how… you were doing today?"

The line stayed silent for a moment. Eli felt the need to clarify. "You just seemed quiet, is all."

Tiredly, Clare propped an elbow on the armrest, a hand moving to cover her eyes. "I had a lot on my mind, I guess."

"Clare," Eli spoke honestly, almost pleading. "This is me you're talking to. You can tell me… I think I know."

Unsure of how exactly to respond to someone so straight forward, Clare swallowed. She couldn't lie. Not to her best friend.

"Yeah," she agreed shakily. Of course he knew.

But before she could get any other words out—not that she had any in mind—the doorbell rang.

"Eli?" Clare asked, getting up from the couch and thankfully padding over to the front door. "Could you maybe hang on a second?"

"Sure thing." She could hear his grin through the phone. "I'll be here."

With a vague smile, Clare cupped a hand over the phone's receiver, as she pulled open the door, assuming her mom forgot her house key again.

The rain continued pounding while another round of thunder rumbled in. But it wasn't what made Clare catch her breath right then. It wasn't the wind that whipped the rain onto her stance in the open doorway. And it certainly wasn't the sight of lightning illumining the night sky.

The phone dropped from her hand.

"_Fitz_?"

The line went dead.

_I learned to live half a life  
And now you want me one more time_


	2. Chapter 2

_Who do you think you are?_

Clare's hand on the doorknob went limp and fell to her side. How many times had she pictured this moment? How many times had she fantasized over this exact monumental event, this reunion after their disaster of a breakup? And now her well rehearsed, planned word-for-word speech fled from memory. In its place, her mind grew inundated, recalling these last few years. The recollections of all she tried so hard to repress only to be drudged up yet again after all this time.

He was back. And so were the memories.

**.**

**.**

_Freshman year. Months after KC came to this very doorstep, dumping her for Jenna. Dawes came to her for assistance. There was a student in desperate need of a tutor. It didn't matter that Baby Edwards was a grade younger than the alleged student. Advanced classes and a kind heart were enough to make up for it._

_ A few passing grades later and Fitz got it in his head that maybe Baby Edwards wasn't so little anymore. A few sweet smiles and admiring words later, and Clare thought maybe there was more to Mark than everyone else first typically thought. _

_Just a few more innocent thoughts and shared smiles later and the two were "together," making the rounds through the Degrassi grapevine and not caring in the slightest._

**.**

**.**

_ Their six month anniversary. Clare searched up and down for Mark but it seemed he wasn't at school. He hadn't texted to tell her he was sick. Or called to wish her a happy anniversary—not that he exactly seemed like the type to. But still, Clare had let herself hope for at least an acknowledgement from him, and in this moment, she regretted having done so. Disappointedly, she sat through her first four classes before plodding her way to her locker before lunch. With her eyes trained on the floor, she didn't bother looking up until someone rather obviously and conspicuously cleared his throat._

_ Perplexed, Clare's head shot up. At her locker, Mark Fitzgerald held a dozen yellow daisies and a shy smile._

_ "You remembered," she whispered, struck with awe, letting herself smile for the first time that day._

_ "How could I forget?" he asked her, right before her lips met his._

_ Pulling away with reluctance, the two smiled. Suddenly, Clare smacked his arm playfully. "Why did you let me think you weren't here? You know, you could have called or texted at the very least," she informed him with a teasing grin, though not quite bold enough to look him in the eye after such an admission of worry._

_ "Couldn't," he shrugged boyishly—simply. "I was out getting you these." Diffidently, he held out the daisies as Clare's heart melted._

**.**

**.**

_Months later and Clare's heart was still melting. Mark and Clare almost seemed attached at the hip. By now it was sophomore year. _

_First day, the new kid, Eli Goldsworthy complimented her "pretty eyes." Fitz overheard and connected a fist to his jaw. Alli squealed excitedly for her friend while Clare watched in horror. Jealousy was supposedly a good sign, right? It meant that Mark Fitzgerald, the picture of teenage apathy, really cared. Like an actual boyfriend was supposed to. Right?_

_ Clare apologized repeatedly as the new Eli kid shrugged it off and walked away._

_ Bewildered, Clare looked to Fitz. "Mark…" She didn't even know what to say._

_ He looked up towards the sky. "Look, I kind of really like you a lot, Edwards," he sighed, and Clare got the not altogether unpleasant itching sensation that he was about to breathe words he wouldn't dare to another soul. She felt honored. "And I think I love you." He still hadn't looked at her. Clare's mouth dropped. _Love_? Had he really said he loved her?_

_ "Mark," She took a step forward, never looking back. "I think I love you, too."_

_ He looked at her then, and the reluctant smile she'd grown to love made its appearance. "Good," he slung an arm over her shoulder. "So don't go macking on other guys, you hear?"_

_ Clare laughed as Fitz knew she would. She certainly wouldn't._

**.**

**.**

But those were part of the "good" times. The "good," exceptional and completely more than tolerable parts of their relationship. On her porch steps, the rain dripped from his face. Another crack of thunder roared and in her mind's eye, Clare remembered in sharp, painful clarity, all the other times.

_She was supposed to be working on an English project with Eli Goldsworthy when she heard the doorbell ring, several times. Apologizing, she got up, assuming it to be her obnoxious seven year old neighbor who rather enjoyed ringing the doorbell fifty times for every occasion his mother needed to borrow one of the Edward's coveted family recipes._

_ But instead there stood Mark, high as a kite in the sky, on her doorstep. "Clare!" he grinned, goofily at her as he let out a child-like laugh. "You're home!"_

_ Despairingly, Clare closed her eyes in disbelief. After a moment, she led him by the hand in to the living room and sat down with him on the couch. She thanked the good Lord in Heaven that her parents weren't home yet._

_ "Mark," she squeezed his hand gently, "I thought you said you were done with this stuff?"_

_ Fitz laughed like before, as if he didn't have a single care in the world and every word coming out of Clare's mouth was Comedy Central. "What stuff?" he asked, snickering._

_ Again Clare closed her eyes. She forced back tears. How could she trust him?_

_ "_Oh,"_ he said knowingly with the same foolish grin as Clare's silence lengthened. He pulled a plastic baggy out of his back pocket. "You mean _this_ stuff." He grinned._

_ Clare's eyes widened but she forced herself to stay calm. This wasn't the same Mark she knew. She had to be careful. "Mark," she began with circumspection, pointing to the plastic bag, "May I have that please?"_

_ "Sure!" he acquiesced enthusiastically, handing over the weed._

_ Clare muttered a "thanks" and told him to stay right where he was. Quickly, she made her way upstairs to the bathroom but not before running into her English partner. Clare felt like she could cry. How could she be expected to work on a project with Eli when she was too busy worrying about her lying boyfriend who was sitting on her couch _high_?_

_ Clare dropped her head and Eli's eyes took in the contents of the bag, saying nothing. Desperately, Clare felt the need to explain. After all, Eli was her friend now._

_ "He…" she began unsteadily. They both knew who 'he' was. "He told me he was done with this stuff. He… he said he didn't… _need_ it anymore."_

_ Eli's expression softened as he nudged Clare's shoulder. "C'mon." He opened the bathroom door and held out his hand for the plastic baggy. Handing it over, Clare tried to smile, watching as he flushed its contents down the toilet._

_You broke all of your promises_


	3. Chapter 3

_Yet somehow they made it through. Clare took him back on the promise of change. And soon enough, their one year anniversary had come to pass. Right around exams week. Midterms, to be exact. Fitz thought the end of such an occasion deserved some celebrating. Apprehensive and unsure, Clare swiftly avoided the subject for a short spell. But his persistence grew and quickly Clare soon lost herself in his eyes, letting him slip the ring off her finger. With a noiseless drop to the shadowy ground of the ravine, it buried itself deep in the dirt where even the moonlit sky couldn't reach it._

**.**

**.**

_Mark's promises ringing in her ears, Clare went home that night with eyes heavy and a heart full. 'Nothing would change between them now.' If anything, things would be even 'better' now that the deed was done. Wiping away tears, Clare tried to convince herself what she'd let him do—what she had done—was the right decision. As the night wore on, Clare laid at home in bed, willing sleep to come. _

_But it never came._

**.**

**.**

_ The next day at school. The final day of exams. The day of the dance. Fitz greeted Clare with an unnaturally public display of affection. Yes, he was proud of his prize. He'd finally won at last._

_ Meanwhile, his buddies were not blind. _

_From her spot by the school steps, Clare noticed Owen slip Tyler a twenty, as the two walked over to the couple. Tyler then proceeded to reach out to Fitz. But Fitz was shooting daggers. His jaw tightened and his lip clenched, trying to signal to them that they would settle all bets later. In spite of Fitz's glare—or more likely, because of it—his buddies opened their mouths._

_ "So, not so Saintly now, are you, Miss Clare?"_

_ "Never thought I'd see the day…"_

"… _never shoulda doubted you, Fitzy boy."_

"_I always knew you could do it…"_

_It was almost as if Clare was hearing it all from under water and the world was spinning much too fast and upside down on its axis. Jaw dropping, she watched as Mark's friends slipped bills into his hand. Heard them whisper none too kindly about her now seemingly infamous wild night the previous evening. Incredulous, Clare stood still as Fitz said nothing in response. Apparently, Clare wasn't to have found out about the guys' little "bet."_

"_So, Saint Clare, does daddy know about your extracurriculars now?" Owen's smirking face somehow snapped her back to reality. "Will ya have to go to confession twice this week?"_

_That's when the tears came. _

_And that's when she ran._

**.**

**.**

_ Her vision twisted and turned, blurry, but it didn't matter. She ran past the front entrance and into the school. She had no idea where she was going, as long as it was _somewhere_ away from Fitz and all his empty promises._

_ So this was just a bet, huh? A little game for him to master and win?_

_ Clare continued speeding through the halls. At one point, she thought she might have heard the bell ring, not that she cared. No one seemed to notice that she was the only one left alone in the halls. Slowly, she sank her back against the unyielding, unforgiving lockers. She still had that sinking feeling in her gut, as if she were below water, drowning in her own sea of disbelief._

_ A bet? A bet? She gave him her virtue and for what? For him to be twenty dollars richer?_

_ Was that all it was? All it ever was? All that pressure, just so he could claim her as his property and parade her around for the world to see?_

_ Tightly, Clare pulled her legs to her chest. It was getting harder and harder to breathe. And all she could think, over and over, the question she asked herself until the words became hollow and meaningless: "Is this what love is supposed to feel like?"_

_You lost the love…_

_ For an indiscernible amount of time, Clare sat there on the cold, stiff floor, with the feeling that her life had just spun disastrously off course. She had no idea what it all meant, what she was supposed to do… so instead of doing anything— showing up for her class, taking her test—she just sat there. Her head in her hands, Clare only knew one thing for certain: she had no ambition to get up off the floor anytime soon._

…_I loved the most_


	4. Chapter 4

_I wish I had missed the first time that we kissed_

'_Cause you broke all of your promises_

"_Hey." It wasn't until a shadow appeared that Clare glanced up. "I've been looking everywhere for you."_

_Thickly, she wiped her tears away with the back of her hand, embarrassed that Eli was seeing her like this. No doubt, he had overheard Owen and friends. Clare got the feeling a lot of people overheard._

_ She bit her lip as she watched him slide down next to her._

_ Hoarse and cracked from obvious reasons, she murmured a half hearted, "What are you doing here?"_

_ "Thought you could use a friend." Eli only shrugged. "I'm here… to talk."_

_ His offer was greeted by silence. There were so many things that could have been said, but Clare felt too ashamed to admit them._

_ Finally, she spoke. "When I was in junior high, my sister was raped."_

_ Eyes closed tight, Clare heard Eli's breath seem to hitch in his chest for a short moment. She too had no idea how those words had come out of her mouth. And yet, they kept coming. "She tried to kill herself afterward."_

_ With her eyes still clamped shut, she heard a pained, "Clare…" But no other words followed. Even Eli didn't know what to say._

_ Unsteadily, Clare let out a sigh "She was so young and a stranger just came and took… took it all away from her. But me?" She looked up to the ceiling, wondering if there was indeed a God up there after all, and speculating if He'd understand. "I don't know what I was thinking… he…" She needn't say who, both of them knew. "He just kept _saying things_ and… _pressuring_… and I'm not sure it was exactly…" she staggered over the words awkwardly and discomfited, "_consensual, _but it's not like it was rape, either." Her mind pictured Darcy all those years ago. This was _not_ the same thing._

_Eli's eyes found hers, his voice uncharacteristically tentative. "Can I ask you a sort of personal question?"_

_ Perversely, Clare almost felt the desire to laugh. No one had ever asked that question to her before. If anything, they thought what they wanted, or simply butted in and asked anyway. But Clare kept her laugh inward. It didn't feel like the right kind of funny. _

"_Shoot," she murmured, giving him the go ahead, faintly anxious of what he might say._

_ Eli looked her square in the eye. His tone wasn't accusing, but genuinely wondering. "Why are you with him?"_

_ Clare blinked, not expecting that. Though as of late, a lot of things happened that she hadn't expected. Dropping her head slightly, Clare focused her eyes on the patterns of the tiled floor. Both wistful and melancholy, she thought back to the day she and Mark first met. How the two seemed to see past the high school labels and stereotyped rumors surrounding each. _

_Something about him thrilled her to the core. _

_When she first tutored him, she loved the way his eyebrows would crease in deep, pensive thought and the way, after weeks of longing to do so, she finally got up the nerve to reach out and smooth the wrinkles of his forehead with a gentle touch. _

_She loved the way his eyes sparkled when he grinned sheepishly, as if he were still little. Or even the way he would skip class to buy her flowers on their sixth month anniversary._

_ But then._

_ Then there were other complications. The pressures he put on her. His history of drugs. His track record of lying._

_ Clare bit her lip, not answering the question. "Did you hear about him and Bianca?"_

_ Eli said nothing in response. Clare knew he had. She continued on anyways. "He thought—still thinks that I don't know. How he and Bianca… hooked up in the boiler room a few months back." Clare stared at the wall. "I told him I had to leave school for a doctor's appointment…and I did. But I had to come back later for a yearbook meeting. And I saw them all… giggly and rumpled clothes, coming up from the stairs that lead to the basement." Clare hugged her knees tighter to her chest. "I'm not stupid." Hearing her words in her own ears, she paused. "Though now, that fact seems open for debate."_

_ Shaking his head, Eli tried to lock eyes but Clare remained transfixed with the some spot on the opposite wall. "Clare, you're not stupid. He is."_

_ Scoffing, she didn't dare look at him. "I trusted him. I thought he could change." Intensely her voice seemed to raise an octave. How could she have been so _stupid_? _

_She still hugged her knees tight. "I loved him, Eli. I still do. Even after everything that's happened, even now when I practically just got harassed by his friends, I still love him. How can you think I'm not the stupid one?"_

_Carefully, Eli unraveled an arm that clutched her knees to her chest. He brought her hand into his. "Because," he stated simply, not explaining, though his eyes seemed to convey reason enough. "I just know." He gave her hand a gentle squeeze before placing it back on her knee. "You're not stupid."_

_Quiet enveloped the empty hallway by the time Clare finally got around to answering Eli's original question._

_ "I don't know why I'm with him." Never had she felt so open and vulnerable and exposed. "I don't know."_

_Who do you think you are _

_Running round leaving scars?_

_Collecting your jar of hearts_

_Tearing love apart?_


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: Thanks for all the lovely reviews!**

_You're gonna catch a cold  
From the ice inside your soul  
So don't come back for me  
Who do you think you are?_

Through the continuing storm, Clare remained still, wide-eyed on her porch steps, transfixed with horror, though most prevalent was shock. Forcefully, she blinked. Perhaps only a second had passed since she had so inadvertently swung open the door allowing _him_ to waltz back into her life.

Neither spoke.

Another second came to pass and Clare couldn't shake the memories.

_I learned to live half alive  
And now you want me one more time_

_She took Eli's hand, finally allowing him to let him pull her up off the floor. When Clare was up on her own two feet and the tears subsided, Eli gently let her hand fall. Wondering, Clare became strangely aware of how limp it laid at her side._

_To distract herself and to ward off another painful conversation about _him—_whom she did _not _wish to speak of—Clare asked the first thing that came to mind. "Don't you have an exam to take?"_

_Eli shrugged it off. "It can wait."_

_Positively incredulous, Clare stopped in he tracks. "What do you mean," she spoke slowly, not understanding. "_'It can wait?'"

_Smirking, Eli stopped alongside her. "It means," he spoke lightly in assurance, "I'll take it later when you do."_

_But Clare shook her head not at all feeling Eli's confidence. "Look Eli, I _really—" _her voice cracked though she tried so hard to keep the emotion out of it. "…appreciate it, but you need to go."_

_This time it was Eli who shook his head. "I'm not going anywhere. Don't worry about my test. I'll take it later."_

_"Eli," she sighed, hopelessly looking to the ceiling as if for support. "There is no 'later.'" Her voice was a whisper now, like she didn't have the energy to speak up. "It's done. It's over. That's it." She wasn't even sure of what she was talking about anymore. Her head was a mess._

_Clare's eyes found Eli's as she spoke next, her voice the same hoarse, low murmur. "You should go."_

_Silently and unsure, Eli stood there observing her, contemplating whether to listen. He nodded and opened his mouth to speak when—_

_"You heard her, emo boy. _Leave."

_Like the last time she saw _him_ that morning, Clare felt like she was struggling underwater and the world was spinning off its axis, upside down._

_"Mark," she managed to choke out._

_He turned on her. "I've been looking everywhere for you!" Broken indignation. "This where you've been this whole time?" Disgustedly he thrust a thumb in Eli's direction. "With _him?"

_Feeling as helpless as ever, Clare vaguely noticed that her eyes were filling up again. Filling up and overflowing. His anger barely registered with her. All she could manage was all she could think right then: _"How could you?"

_No longer aware of Eli's presence in the opposite side of the empty hallway, a guilty dark cloud appeared to pass across Fitz's face. But he remained stoic. Silent for once._

_"How long?" she choked out roughly._

_Softening some, the tables turning, Fitz took a step forward, ready now with open arms. But Clare took a step back. She wanted none of that—none of _him_ right now, not anymore._

_Louder this time, she repeated a bit more clearly: "How long have you known about…" Clare struggled with her words, conscious of Eli silently standing there and Fitz's looming, sorry face. "…how long have you been a part of this… this bet?"_

_A shadow moved over Mark's features. "A little while."_

_Clare blinked back the tears that kept coming, trying to focus. "How long is a 'while?'' There were parts of her that wanted his horrible, honest answer and sick, pathetic, broken parts of her that almost wanted to be lied to._

_Fitz stared off at a spot over her shoulder. Reluctant, he admitted, "Since last summer."_

_Again, Clare felt the waters rise and the feeling of a tide pulling her under, her world falling off course and off its axis._

_"So," she started shakily, deciding right then that more that anything, she wanted to set the record straight. "You mean to say that last night you wanted me to… because they were paying you?"_

_Fitz's eyes darted everywhere but Clare's. Quickly he spoke in a desperate rush. "No, no, that wasn't all of it, Clare. You know I love you, babe. I did it—_we_ did it—because we wanted to." His dark eyes were adamant. "Last night was the best."_

_Clare felt her cheeks flush but it wasn't because of the "compliment." Every word out of his mouth just made the tide-pulling-sinking-sick-to-her- stomach feeling ache even more. She bit her lip. "Better than Bianca?"_

_It was like she flipped a switch right then. Fitz knew she knew. And he was pissed. And suddenly aware of Eli's presence in the hallway again. "You!" he pointed. "You the one feeding her these lies? You sense a weak spot and you come crawling in through, trying to make time with my girl?"_

_In a matter of seconds, Eli's expression transformed from silent distaste to animated indignation. "I'm not _'crawling through' _anything trying to '_make time' _with anybody's 'girl.'" The volume increased as Clare just stood there, hearing it all unfold. _

_"She knew about Bianca all this time!" Eli had no idea why he said that in that moment, but was glad he did. He was tired of skating around the truth. The Neanderthal hurt Clare. Fair was fair._

_Fitz blinked in surprise but swiftly changed course. "There's nothing _to_ know."_

_Eli laughed darkly. "And would 'nothing' happen to be a synonym for 'boiler room?' Because I'm afraid even you can't deny there's truth to _that _statement."_

_Fitz seemed to growl. "You don't know a thing, Goldsworthy."_

_"On the contrary, Fitzy," Eli spat, moving himself between Mark and Clare. "I know _plenty."

_Tangibly, Fitz's enmity seemed to radiate in waves off of him. Shivering, Clare could feel it even with Eli standing in her way. "It was nothing, Clare!" he spoke with rage, desperate to convince her and himself. "She just gives me the weed. Honest."_

_Clare closed her eyes, sick of seeing his poorly concealed lies. And instead, deadpanned: "I though you were done with that stuff? That you didn't need it now with me there?"_

_Mark said nothing while trapped in his corner._

_And don't you know I'm not your ghost anymore  
_

Clare blinked back to the present, a single tear cascading down her cheek. "I was never enough for you, was I?"

_You lost the love I loved the most_


	6. Chapter 6

_I know I can't take one more step towards you  
'Cause all that's waiting is regret  
_

Clare's words reverberated into the soaking wet night. "I was never enough for you, was I?" _Never enough. Never enough for you. No, no. Never enough._

Fitz seemed not to have any audible answer.

_And don't you know, I'm not your ghost anymore?_

_A teacher patrolling the halls spied Clare, Mark and Eli at a standoff in the hallway. Absolutely appalled, she dragged them by the ear to Principal Simpson's office, who incidentally, couldn't have been more shocked. _

_The Fitzgerald boy, that one came as no surprise. _

_But the new student, Elijah Goldsworthy? Though seemingly a bit odd, he made the honor roll each semester and gave no reason for Simpson to keep too much of an eye on him. Until now. Which was surprising, considering the way Elijah had been able to stay under the radar for the past months of the new school year._

_But _Clare Edwards_? Deliberately missing her midterm exam? _That_ came as quite the shock. Only vaguely was Clare able to register his astonishment._

_After asking for the other two to wait outside, Simpson spoke to her alone._

"_Clare," he spoke clearly, genuinely confused. So much so that he barely seemed angry. "What is going on?"_

_Clare's eyes remained distant and watery, though she promised herself she was done with all the tears. Forcing herself to respond with at least some small shred of dignity, she only shrugged. "I couldn't take it today, Mr. Simpson."_

"_Excuse me?" he sputtered. Never would he have guessed such a response._

"_I can't do it anymore," Clare sniffled into her hand, breaking her promise. Again and again she felt the waves crash into her chest. The tide pulling her in, taking her under. How could she be expected to take a ridiculous exam on European monarchs in history when it felt as if her stomach were about to heave up the sorry remnants of her shattered heart?_

_She was no longer talking about the test—if she ever had been—but something more entirely, Simpson was sure._

"_I just can't do it anymore, Mr. Simpson."_

_He looked at her with sympathetic eyes. She knew he was remembering. In his mind's eye, watching her grow up all over again. Watching her take her first steps down these high school halls. Remembering the way he knew it before when it happened with Darcy. Then, he let him assure himself it was nothing. But now he wouldn't stand for it._

"_What's going on, Clare?"_

"_I—" She struggled for words, only somehow managing to finish her tale. When she finally did, Simpson only nodded, his eyes wide with concern and something like understanding._

"_I think it's time you go home. We'll talk about this later."_

_You lost the love I loved the most_

_Nervously, Clare exited Simpson's office, head bent down, unsure if she could face _him _again. But Fitz was nowhere to be seen. _Typical. _Clare knew she should have known. Perverse and pathetically, she speculated whether or not she was glad he fled. Whether or not she was happy to be rid of him. If such a feeling were even possible after everything. Because surely this meant that it was over._

But Clare could not have been more wrong.

Their story was far from done.

_Who do you think you are running round leaving scars?  
Collecting your jar of hearts?  
Tearing Love apart?_


	7. Chapter 7

_~I learned to live  
Half alive~_

_Flashback to the awkward conversation with her mom when she came to pick Clare up from school shortly after the encounter with Principal Simpson._

_Flashback to the cold air and the rain hitting the car windows at full volume on the quiet ride home._

_Flashback to her mom eyeing her curiously and then leaving her alone in her room to "grieve in peace." Clare could almost laugh at the statement. With her silent tears streaming down her cheeks, she tried desperately to somehow wrap her mind around the day's events. Indeed, she knew her mother's words were all wrong. This grief could only tear her to pieces._

_~Who do you think you are…_  
_Tearing love apart?~_

_Flashback to Alli's face appearing in her doorway, two tickets in hand._

_"Nuh-uh." Clare shook her head and clutched her pillow tighter to her chest, sinking further into the comforting covers of her bed. "I'm not going."_

_Alli's face softened, beginning her pleas. "Clare, don't let that jerk get to you. You can have fun without him. Come to the dance with me. Please."_

_Clare's eyes fell to the floor. She shouldn't do this. She couldn't do this. She just _couldn't_. "Not tonight, Alli."_

_The Bhandari girl grew uncharacteristically quiet. Then, "You know dances weren't ever his thing. He won't even be there…I think this could be good for you. Like ripping off a big, ugly band-aid. You know, that saying: 'the journey of a thousand miles—' say, like, getting over a greaseball Neanderthal—'begins with a single step.'"_

_Clare chewed on her lip. She couldn't go. She wouldn't. She shouldn't. "I don't have anything to wear."_

_Giving Clare a bright smile, Alli knew her battle was won. "What would you do without me?"_

_~It took so long just to feel alright  
__Remember how to put back the light in my eyes~_

_Flashback to the Degrassi gymnasium turned Vegas casino. Clare feeling nervous and out of place. Tottering in her mom's high heels. Alli close by. Music blasting. Adam waving. Eli just entering the gym._

_"Hey." His smile was small and his eyebrows were raised. Alli quickly excused herself, claiming a sudden thirst for punch._

_"Hey." Clare didn't know what to say. The boy had witnessed so much and still he was here talking to her. _

_"I didn't know you were coming tonight," Eli commented with a forced air of nonchalance. Clare appreciated his efforts and that he was actually at least trying to restrain his curiosity._

_"Me neither." Slight shrug and then an explanation for Eli's confusion. "I don't know why I let Alli talk me into anything."_

_Eli's eyes found hers without ever wavering. "Alli's not all bad."_

_Clare braced herself for words like "she only means well" or "she just cares about you," but they didn't come. Instead what came next made Clare catch her breath._

_"Would you like to dance?" And then as if some sort of clarification was deemed necessary: "With me?"_

_Clare didn't object._

~_I hear you're asking all around  
If I am anywhere to be found~_

_Flashback to the moment of dancing with Eli, the two head banging to some rock song with guitars blaring. Flashback to the startling second her eyes caught sight of a messy shock of brown hair and a freckled face flushed red._

_"Mark," the name caught in her throat. He was here. He was here at the back of the gymnasium standing alone by some card table. He was here._

_"Oh God, oh God, oh God," she muttered without conscious thought, feet firmly steeled to the dance floor._

_"Clare," Eli's face bent towards her in concern. "What is it, Clare?"_

_Head shaking back and forth, her eyes fluttered shut. "Oh God, oh _God_." He's here. He was _here_._

_In another second, she felt an arm drape around her shoulders, walking her along somewhere. "It's okay. Whatever it is, it's alright, Clare. We can stop dancing. We'll take a break and rest awhile. It's okay. We'll sit in the hallway for awhile."_

_Flashback to the second time that day that Clare found herself sitting against the lockers, on the floor with Eli at her side. She tried to slow her heart beat, will it not to care anymore, to give up loving at all. In vain she tried to stop the tears from coming, too tired of crying. Too tired of this all consuming feeling of weak helplessness._

_"He's here, Eli," she finally managed._

_Eli remained quiet at first. But then his reassuring arm was around her again. "'S okay. We won't let him hurt you anymore."_

_Flashback to the moment Clare gave in to her physical and heartfelt exhaustion. Finally allowing herself to rest her head on his shoulder, hoping against all hope that he was right. That he _could_ be right._

_And flashback to the moment before they all realized that he could not have been more wrong._

_~And now you're back  
You don't get to get me back~_

**A/N: Your thoughts would be much appreciated :) [****Do you think the lyrics still fit well with the chapter?] ...Also, my apologies with the inconsistent updating schedule. I wait every time for inspiration to strike. Hopefully it wasn't a miss. **

**~Thanks~**


	8. Chapter 8

**A/N: Okay, so I have to say I'm really pretty excited about this story right now. I love how this chapter turned out, even though it was actually nothing like I'd planned. So anyways, I hope you like it and I am really rather sorry about the terrible updating schedule I have going. I just want it to be perfecto.**

**Enjoy, pretty please :)**

_No, I can't take one more step towards you  
'Cause all that's waiting is regret_

"Clare, I just—" Mark took a deep breath on her doorstep. "I just want to talk to you."

But Clare's mind was still foggy with thoughts of that night. It felt like so long ago. It _was _so long ago. Ancient history, really. She didn't know what to think.

_I hear you're asking all around  
If I am anywhere to be found  
_

_There at the school dance, Clare let herself be comforted for once in her life. No longer the one to wipe away tears, which had so often been the case with Darcy, or the one to spew kind words of reassurance, like with Alli. No. This time Clare gave herself over to be the one comforted. To have her tears wiped away by a forgiving friend. To let herself hear the consoling words of Elijah Goldsworthy as he softly laid an arm around her shoulder against the Degrassi Community School lockers._

_Clare didn't know what to think. Whether she should even let herself be open to such comfort. Such reassurance and relief. Such vulnerability._

_So she stopped thinking and merely sat there with her friend instead._

_But I have grown too strong  
To ever fall back in your arms_

_"Can I ask you something?" Eli asked for the second time that day, an indiscernible amount of time later. Soft but clear, an almost serious quality to his tone._

_Clare smiled in spite of herself. This whole not-thinking-thing seemed to have the desired effects. "Ask away," she murmured, not bothering to feel self-conscious._

_"Do you remember the day we first met?"_

_Clare closed her eyes, head resting against the locker, tilting up towards the ceiling. "Yes," she breathed. How could she forget? "You do know how to make an entrance."_

_Eli let out a little laugh, though Clare could sense he was only building up to his real question. But he started off slowly, for her benefit, not yet solemn. "It was the first day of school and you were walking with Alli and—" Clare braced herself for the inevitable name. "Fitz." She didn't even wince. _

_Eli continued on as if without pause. "And Alli went and threw your old glasses in the street and I pulled up and ran them over." The two smiled slightly at the memory. "Unknowingly, of course," Eli clarified with the smallest of smirks. "And then…" This time the pause was deliberate, forcing Clare to open her eyes at him._

_"And then," she spoke for him, almost cautiously as if the memory were playing itself over in her mind in slow motion. Which, for the record, it was. "You complimented my eyes."_

_"Probably not the _brightest_ move on my part," Eli acknowledged, "Considering the way you were holding hands with your boyfriend right at the time." _

_Eli's lips turned upwards in a half smiled while Clare's expression immediately turned blank. No longer was she not thinking. It always came back to Fitz_

"Then," _Eli gently pressed on, still building up to his real question of the evening. "He punched me," Eli remembered, the smile still on his face, oddly enough. He seemed to find the memory quite funny._

"_I remember," Clare admitted quietly._

_But again, Eli acted as if uninterrupted, though he brought a supportive hand down into hers. "But you know, it didn't really bother me. Not then. Not even now…Well," he chuckled. "Maybe a _little_ bit then," Clare didn't even smile. So Eli cut the jokes and turned solemn. _

"_But not anymore," he spoke decisively. Knowing full well what he was about to say. As if he had known all along. "Because he may have hit me, but he hadn't gotten me where it really hurts." Eli tried to lock eyes, but Clare stared at a distant spot on the opposite wall. Eli's voice lowered. "But hearing what he did to you? Seeing you this morning? This way tonight?" He softly brushed a loose curl behind her ear. "That's where it gets me. Where it really hurts. I hate to see you cry, Clare. I hate to see you hurt. Broken like this."_

_Clare looked down at their two hands intertwined. She knew she was lucky to have Eli as a friend right now. She cleared her throat. "So what's you question, Eli?"_

_Vaguely, he smiled a small sort of melancholy grin. Of course she knew he still had his question. "My real question is…if you had known the way this would all turn out that day…would you have changed anything?" His thumb ran soothing circles on the back of her hand._

_Clare bit her lip. She didn't want to cry anymore. "Honestly?" Her voice was shaky and hoarse._

_Eli nodded._

"_I—"_

_But Clare never got the chance to finish. Because in that moment, that's when she became painfully aware of the knife glinting in a tight closed fist at the end of the darkened hallway._

_And now you're back  
You don't get to get me back_

"_You _what, _Clare-bear?" Fitz's voice ricocheted across the empty hallway's walls. "You wish you'd never met me?" he spat. The enmity seemed to echo somewhere inside the deep recesses of Clare's heart. Insidious._

_Fitz continued walking toward them, though stagger would be the more likely term. The blade, shining face down in his right hand._

_His shouting grew with more hostility than ever. "You wish you didn't _love_ me?" Fitz lifted his hands in the air, showcasing the knife for all to see. "'Cause I know you do! Come on, just say it! We both know it!" Hatefully, he gestured with the dagger in hand to first Clare, and then Eli. "We all know it here!"_

_Shivering, Clare couldn't stop her hands from shaking as Eli stood up, taking a firm stance between the two of them. Clare didn't even know how she managed to get up off her feet._

_Terriefied, forlorn, empty. "I…Mark." Broken, beaten. "I can't." Shattered._

"_No." Shaking. Fury. "No. You don't mean that." Fitz edged closer. Clare could already smell the alcohol on his breath. The smoke in the air, radiating off his jacket._

_Shaking. Vulnerable. "I can't."_

_Eli's voice of reason somehow tried to fight a way through. His hands were raised as if displaying a white flag. "Just let it go, Fitz. Just leave her alone."_

"_Let it go? _Let it go? _The hell I'll let it go! To fucking hell I'll let it go!" Closer and closer, he towered over Eli, enraged with viciousness and a terrorizing sort of intensity. "Why is it that you come off so fucking superior and so goddamn bossy all the time, huh?" Fitz gave Eli a hard shove with the handle of the blade. He backed him into the corner as the two left Clare further and further behind. "You think you're so much better for Clare, _don't_ you?" Fitz's voice reached a new level of earsplitting capacity. "You think you know what she wants? Well." Mark was in his face now. Practically snarling. "You. Don't. Know. _Anything_."_

_Clare felt her legs give out from under her. "Mark. Mark, please." Her hands still shook with every breath she took. "Please. Please don't do this." Trembling hands, tearful heart. "It's me you want." Quivering fear. "Don't hurt him. _Please_."_

_But Fitz never looked back. "Shut up, bitch!" he ordered right before he plunged the dagger forward._

_Leaving scars  
Collecting your jar of hearts  
And tearing love apart_

_Eli fell to the ground as Clare let loose a shriek to wake the dead. Eli's eyes rolled back in his head and his knees hit the floor._

"_What did you do?" Clare could hardly find her voice by the time she stopped screaming. It was barely above a whisper. What had she done to deserve this? Maybe she brought it on herself, breaking her promise to God. But _Eli_? What had Eli done to deserve this? What did _anyone_ do to deserve this?"_

_Fitz could only stare from his now empty, cold-blooded hands to the knife piercing Eli's side, tearing through his blazer and seeping through red. Mark's face completely drained at the site. "I—I didn't…"_

_And then he ran._

_You're gonna catch a cold  
From the ice inside your soul  
Don't come back for me  
Don't come back at all_


	9. Chapter 9

**A/N: Prepare for cheese. Of the Cheesy Angst variety. Or is it Angsty Cheese? Yeah. Sorry. Hopefully it makes sense…**

_  
__No, I can't take one more step towards you_

Fitz stood still as a crack of thunder rumbled overhead. Clare felt the understandably overwhelming urge to slam shut the door in his face and curl up under safe covers and hide in sleep for forever. But she didn't. She couldn't.

She was frozen in time. Frozen in place.

_'Cause all that's waiting is regret_

_It was all a blur. Eli in her arms. His blood on her hands. The knife left abandoned on the floor in Mark's haste to flee. Terrifying and unsettling, Eli's raspy breaths were coming in shallow gasps, echoing against the hallway walls. It was too much. All too much_

_Clare heard a scream and she just wished the noise would stop. Eli looked like he was in so much pain, breathing heavily and his eyes shut tight._

_Still screaming. Clare wondered if or when it would ever end. She felt tears in her eyes and a tentative hand grasp her shoulder. The screaming subsided. Clare was shocked to realize it had been she who had caused it. Almost completely unreal, her body felt numb as she looked up to see Mr. Simpson above her._

"_Sir—I don't even—" Her hands shook with each struggling word._

_He cut her off with a sharp shake of his head. Within seconds a team of medics arrived and swept Eli away. Just like that and he was gone._

_For the first time that day, Clare was left feeling so small and alone in that hallway, alone without Eli. Principal Simpson tried to help, keeping an arm around her shoulder and steering her to the light._

_You lost the love I loved the most_

"You're with him now, aren't you?" Mark's sudden question was quiet and unplanned, just a low whisper in the rain, as random as his unexpected intrusion back into her life had been. It shook her out of the memories and brought her back to the present moment.

Consequently, Clare could not have been more surprised. Of all the things she'd expected him to say, this one barely even made sense to her. "Who?"

There was something in his eyes Clare couldn't quite place. The expression itself she hardly recognized. He was taken aback by her confusion, sure, but there was something else. Something deeper. A fire no longer burned insidiously in them as it had for so long, Instead, there lacked resentment. No hatred. Only hurt. And something like regret.

"Eli." Lightening lit his face as he clarified, speaking the name as if the answer should have been obvious. "You're with him now, aren't you?" Not an accusation. Just sad, reticent resignation. Something like acceptance.

_It took so long just to feel alright  
Remember how to put back the light in my eyes_

_Clare could only remember it in flashes. Blurs. The rest of the night spent at the hospital. Cece and Bullfrog clutching hands tightly, Alli's arms around her and Adam squeezing a hand. Principal Simpson looking sickly but trying to stand strong. Her mother not answering any of her calls._

_ The tired looking doctor pulling the Goldworthys aside. The snippets of conversation she heard from a distance because she wasn't _family…_"Critical condition… lost a lot of blood… surgery…" The words floated through the air but Clare could hardly make sense of them._

_ This was her fault. All her fault._

_ And her mother still hadn't answered any of her calls._

_I've learned to live, half alive_

_ Midnight came and Clare still had no idea where her mother was or if it was at all possible to get comfortable on the stiff hospital chairs or _how_ Adam and Alli could fall asleep on her shoulder in the waiting room at a time like this. And she certainly didn't know what it meant if a person was in "critical but stable condition" or when she would even get to see Eli._

_ She only wanted a chance to apologize. But she knew fate would just be cruel to her. Make her wait anxiously and wretchedly. More than fair enough punishment for letting Eli come to her rescue. Clare told herself she could live with the waiting. As long as he made it out alive._

_Leaving scars…  
Tearing love apart_

A firm "no," Clare shook her head but adamantly admitted, "He's my best friend," the tears swimming faster down her cheeks now. His face filled her mind. Eli made her smile. Made her laugh. Feel happy again. Whole inside after all this time has gone by.

Such a complete and total polar-opposite contrast to the boy now standing before her.

If Fitz was a firework explosion that shook her to the core and made her love fiercely and by the same token, reduce her to tears just as easily, Eli was a like a candlelight shining defiantly in a soft, benevolent glow. A slow yet brilliant sunrise on a new day. Somehow there to bring her hope.

Clare knew she loved him like any girl would love her very best friend. But she felt that Fitz had misunderstood. Ever since Vegas Night, Clare told herself she didn't love Eli in that way. The way she used to love Mark. She felt sure she wouldn't love anyone like she had him.

Although this didn't stop her eyes from continuing to flood, remembering the time when she felt convinced she no longer had either of them. And inexplicably, the one boy she perhaps missed the most—the one she thought was gone from the world on that dark, unforeseen night, the one she watched crumble to the ground—was the one she let comfort her fears and insecurities, alone, earlier that evening in that dank, ill-lit hallway.

Yes. Clare remembered. She felt sure she could never forget.

The painful hours spent at that hospital, just waiting helplessly for _something. _The moment the doctor smiled tiredly at Bullfrog and Cece and told them they could see their son. That same moment when Clare let her tears fall in a giant wave of immense relief and grateful release. Clutching her mother tightly when she finally—_finally_, hurriedly entered the room. And Clare tearfully thanking the good Lord, oh Sweet Jesus, thanking God that he was alright.

But most of all, she remembered Cece coming out of her son's room, her cheeks still stained with tears. Smiling at Clare, telling her that her baby boy wanted to see her.

Yes. Clare remembered. She clung to his hand, vowing to never let go of him. Her very best friend. She felt sure she would never forget.

_Feel alright, remember how to put back the light in my eyes_


	10. Chapter 10

**A/N: Sorry about last night! I updated the wrong doc. My apologies x20394850928345098 bajillion for being so dang inconsistent.**

**Thanks for sticking with me! I very much 'ppreciate it. **

**And I'm thinking I'll be wrapping this story up within the next few chapters...we'll see how that goes...I'm still not all that sure about the ending and where this is going and yeah.**

**Enjoy, please?**

_It took so long just to feel alright  
Remember how to put back the light in my eyes_

Mark nodded vaguely as Clare looked up at the dark sky above them. She knew he didn't understand. Not really. She herself hardly knew what she was saying.

Her life never used to be this complicated. But now it seemed as if she'd be tangled forever in this…mess. No, her life hadn't always been this way. Once, she was normal, unbroken. But life had made her jaded, yet dare she say it?—strong.

She might be confused and torn and unsure of her feelings for the boy before her and her best friend, but at least now she was standing on her own. She'd given up on the hope of closure shortly after Vegas Night but still Clare liked to think she was at least healed now. Yes, you could still see her scars, barely visible through the façade of the everyday life she's built up protectively around herself along with her ever budding friendship with Eli and the rest of the kids of Degrassi.

But even Fitzy took note of the scars. He knew he was to blame. Perhaps that was why he saw them so clearly. If only he had noticed her and seen her—really seen her—before this…mess. Maybe then the scars wouldn't even be there now, messing with her beautiful face, making her look older, wiser. But they were there. They were there because of him. And the thought left Mark at a loss for words. He suddenly forgot why he was here at all in the first place. Clare seemed to have made it clear that this even was shocking and…unnecessary? Fitz stared at his hands. He couldn't read her anymore, like he used to.

_I wish I had missed the first time that we kissed  
'Cause you broke all your promises_

For a solid few moments, the crash of rain on earth and pavement became the only sound heard. Clare's eyes remained trained on the sky, not caring in the slightest that she was getting soaked. Slowly, something inside her swam to the surface. A confidence she never seemed to have. A voice. Clear, smooth, devoid of emotion. Careful.

"It's been a year, Fitz. Is there a reason you're here?"

His head snapped up, no longer examining his nail bitten fingers. He noticed how she didn't call him by his first name. She was really the only one besides his mother who called him that. Even Principal Simpson referred to him by his nickname. But nonetheless, she had addressed him and he searched desperately for something to say to her.

As she waited, Clare made sure her face arranged itself into an inscrutable expression. There was too much going on inside her head. It was all she could do not to let it show.

_And now you're back  
_

His hands shook. "I just need to talk to you."

Clare kept her eyes steady, but her voice she could no longer control. It was too much. All too much. "It's been a year," she repeated, incredulous. "Mark, it's been a whole year." Just as her tears had stopped, they picked up once again. All too much.

Head bent. A seemingly different person. "I know. That's why I need to talk to you."

Clare openly gaped. She found herself shaking her head. She owed him _nothing._ Not her time, not her—

"Please," he pleaded with her. "To apologize."

Clare looked heavenwards. Then almost without even realizing it, she opened the door wider, letting him inside out of the rain.

_You don't get to get me back_

"Clare, I—" There he stood in her home, sopping wet, the rain running off his soaked hoodie and onto the floor. He shivered and Clare felt her resolve waver ever so slightly. She left the room and returned with a towel. Slowly, she held it out to him.

Taken aback, Mark thanked her and pulled the towel around over his shoulders.

"Look," Clare cleared her throat, breaking the silence, praying to God in Heaven that he wasn't getting the wrong idea. The thought was too much and Clare knew such an idea was terribly unhealthy for the both of them. "My mother already hates your guts. I can't imagine what she'd say if you ruined her carpet." Clare kept her tone flat, without humor.

Fitz nodded. He opened his mouth and then closed it. Clare shut her eyes tight, waiting for him to speak. As she stood there blindly, she noticed how much of her life she spent waiting on him, waiting for the truth, waiting for him to come around. Standing there, she realized what a child she was being, eyes shut as if the "I can't see you/you can't see me" three year old mentality would make it hurt less.

Finally he spoke. "Can I sit down?"

_Who do you think you are?  
Running round leaving scars  
Collecting your jar of hearts  
And tearing love apart_

Clare's eyes flew open and quickly she nodded dumbly as Mark took a seat on the stairs. As the seconds ticked by and still Fitz stared at his hands, head bent, Clare wondered what he could possibly say to her after all this time. She kept her distance, her back resting on the closed front door and her hand lay unconsciously on the door knob, as if her subconscious was preparing in the event of an emergency escape.

When it seemed evident Mark wasn't ready to speak up, she found her voice. "You know, you didn't have to come here."

Startled and eyes glassy, Mark's head snapped up. "But I need to."

Clare let out a dark laugh that seemed to come out of nowhere. "You need to _what? Explain?_ Well, save your breath." She couldn't believe she'd let him into her house. She felt sick to her stomach. Fitz's face looked pained as he continued to sit there on the steps. "Clare, I am so—"

"Oh!" Clare couldn't help but interrupt, not even wanting to hear him finish that sentence. She didn't believe it. She couldn't. All too much. "_Now_ you're sorry? You're sorry you almost managed to kill Eli? Sorry you broke me into pieces? Sorry you were too busy getting high all the time to care? Well, I don't want to hear it!" By now, Clare's chest was heaving and she'd long since past the welcome mat of hysteria.

"I know." Again, Mark spoke to his hands, his voice unbelievably small. "I was—am—so many things. I don't think I could even expect you to ever be able to forgive me."

_Learned to live, half alive_

For a while, there was silence Clare couldn't break. Then just as quiet: "So why are you here?"

Finally he looked up into her eyes. "I told you. To apologize." Pause. Admitting, "I was messed up, Clare."

Messed up.

Messed up.

Clare hugged her arms, holding herself together.

So many. So many people. Messed up in the head. In the heart.

_Tearing love apart_

Her first thought was Alli.

_Freshman year. Mascara running, hair falling out, an absolute rats nest. Holding her hand as her friend's eyes overflowed in one ugly mess._

"_He told me he loved me, that I was his first." Clare graciously offered her the box of tissues, staying quiet in solidarity. "God, this is so unfair." Alli complied as she spoke through her tears, the tissues turning an ominous black from the water droplets masked by mascara. "Clare. Clare, you have no idea how lucky I am to have you here."_

_How to put back the light in my eyes?_

_And then Adam in the school yard, alone at the picnic table, dressed in pink. Clare walking up to say hello. Instantly spotting the knife. The scars on his arm. In an instant, covering them with her fingertips. _

"_Clare," he choked, as if it were an apology of some sort. "I just can't be her anymore." Looking anywhere but Clare. "Gracie's like this nightmare I can never wake up from." She quietly watched the evident pain flash in he eyes. "I can't do this on my own anymore._

_Leaving scars_

_Eli. His eyes shot red. Knuckles white, clinging for dear life, clutching the steering wheel of the hearse. Desperately, Clare ached to loosen his fingers from the wheel but she didn't know how. Too busy silently watching his face contort in emotion all too painful._

"_I'm scared to forget her, Clare…but I'm terrified to remember. And," he swallowed, his eyes never leaving the dashboard, "I'm afraid she's ruining my life."_

_Clare felt her own eyes fill up. "Oh, you don't mean that," Clare protested weakly, not knowing what words to say._

"_Yes," Eli's voice rose. "I do." Hanging his head, forehead resting on the wheel. "Because I'm just stuck here… I _need_ to move forward. For you. For Cece and Bullfrog. For me…I need to _live_. But…I can't."_

_Clare was sure she had never seen Eli this way. In her mind, he stood on some sort of pedestal, above such things as tears. Clearly she was wrong._

_Eli lifted his head for just a moment. "Don't you see how messed up this is?" Clare didn't have an answer. "Just," he hesitated, finally lifting his head from the wheel. "Just promise me you'll stick by me? I know it's a lot to ask. Just…please—"_

"_I'll always be your friend, Eli."_

_Half alive_

_And that night at the hospital. Breaking down in a ladies room stall. Believing Eli dead and thinking Fitz might as well be. Rocking back and forth on the cold tile floor, her heart beating so unjustly loud, it hurt her chest, praying that her best friend would see the light of day. Praying for a life any better than this. Messed up._

_Collecting your jar of hearts_

"Yes." Clare felt herself nod in recognition. She knew the feeling all too well. "Aren't we all?"


	11. Chapter 11

**A/N: I know it's super short, but I felt this was the right ending for this particular chapter, no?  
The next update will probs be the ending…wrapping it up…most likely…we'll see.  
Enjoy, please and thank you!**

_I hear you're asking all around_  
_If I am anywhere to be found_

"Can you ever forgive me?" Fitz looked up from his spot on the stairs. His hair still dripped loose, heavy droplets of rain while Clare looked the other way. Mark then took to staring at his hands. Again. "I mean…I know I don't deserve it, but… I had to ask." He glanced up through his wet lashes while Clare bit her lip. Still it felt all too surreal. Brokenly, Mark spoke. "To see…" Clare picked at her nails. "If things have changed…to prove to someone out there that I've changed."

Seconds ticked by, the clock on the wall the only one in the room seeming to breathe. Mark waited for an answer he didn't really expect. Still Clare chewed on her lip, unknowing how to respond— if she should, what would happen. Finally, the curiosity colored her tone, "Have you...?" Fitz's head snapped up once her voice drifted. "–changed?"

Surprise brightened his dark eyes, his voice raw in honestly. "I don't even know who that person was a year ago."

Nodding slowly, empathetically, Clare felt herself consent. She had to swallow back the sudden lump arisen in her throat. "Me neither."

On the stairs, just a few feet away, Fitz felt he heard something further to the statement. Like there was more to the words she let hang in the air. He cocked his head in confusion. "Who?"

Clare let herself sink slowly to the floor, resting against the back of the front door. She felt tired. So tired. Lethargic. Languid. Exhausted. She shrugged. "Me. You. Both of us."

"You know, I never meant to hurt you."

"I know." Clare nodded there on the foyer floor, keeping her head bent, away from his eyes. She could feel herself losing whatever it was she worked so hard to rebuild over the last year. She couldn't look at him like time hadn't passed. Clare wouldn't let herself. "But you did."

"I know," Fitz spoke, standing up from his step on the stairs and edging closer. "And I am so sorry." He knelt down gently beside her. Clare urged her heart to stop beating so violently. Mark reached for her hands. Clare couldn't stop him. She felt frozen, stuck in time. She urged her heart to stop beating so violently. So precariously. Her heart just wouldn't listen.

_I wish I had missed the first time that we kissed  
_

_She could feel his hands snake to her waist. Feel his breath tickle in her ear. Hear him whisper in the dark. See his eyes dance in the swarming moonlight. Take note of the music drifting through the ravine, his friends laughter through the trees. None of it seemed to matter. Clare felt sure nothing would ever matter, besides this moment, right here, right now. Nothing for forever but him and his smile and his arms and—_

'_Cause you broke all your promises_

Clare cleared her throat, pulling her hands ever so carefully from his. "I really did love you." Her eyes never wavered once. Not even as the tears tumbled down her cheeks.

This time Mark fell to the same boat. His glassy eyes, too, leaked, silently spilling over down his face. His voice, hushed. "Me, too."

The quiet enveloped the room once again. The clock ticked seconds on the wall, breathing while Mark sat by Clare's side breathless. "It won't ever be the same, will it?" he finally braved himself to ask.

"No." Clare shook next to him. "It—"

But her answer was left severed. At the moment, the back door of the house sounded. Footsteps padded through the kitchen. "Clare?" A voice called out. "You there?" The footsteps moved closer, growing louder. "You know it's really rude to hang up the phone on a person like—" Eli's padding footsteps came to a sudden stop when he reached the foyer. "—that." His eyes took in the two on the floor, Fitz's hands still frozen in the air, Clare's clenched at her side.

The clock breathed seconds on the wall, until all three spoke madly at once.

"Eli—"

"I'm—"

Eli's voice barely even a hoarse whisper. "What is he doing here?"

_Don't come back for me  
Don't come back at all_

**A/N: Also, if you're interested, I posted a link on my profile for a picture I edited for a title page to this story. I'd love to hear your thoughts!**


	12. Chapter 12

**Author's note: So this is basically the end I guess. Wow, that sounded really anticlimactic. Anyways, my apologies for taking so long. I'm still not sure if I like how the big confrontation dialogue went but it felt right at the time…**

**Eli probably should have gone completely more insanely mental, but I couldn't bear to write him like that right at the end. As much as its against my totally unwritten policy to go a bit out of character, canon be damned (at the moment). Its fanfiction, isn't it?**

**Try as I might, this was the only ending that came. Although I maaay possibly try to do an epilogue. Depends on your thoughts I suppose :) **

**Enjoy, pretty please.**

_No, I can't take one more step towards you_

Clare's hands shook with each passing second. Silence encompassed the room, weighing down on her heart. A single glance in Eli's direction granted her a vision of his jaw set in a hard line. She could feel his anger, but most prominently, his fear.

_"What is he doing here?"_

Clare barely even knew where to begin.

Eli's eyes rebounded from hers to Fitz's and back again. She felt as if each bone in her body were crumbling, shattering as the revelation came to her that Eli, her best friend, thought she had actually _called_ Mark—the druggie, psychotic ex-boyfriend who pulled a knife on him at the school dance—and happily, _freely,_ brought him into her home. Premeditative. Perfidious.

With beseeching eyes, Clare tried her hardest to plead with Eli, her cheeks still stained with old tears, but the words wouldn't come. They stayed stuck in her throat. He had to know she hadn't done this willingly_. He just had to_. How could she have known Mark would show up like this? Yes, she had indeed let him inside out of the rain, but…

Clare shook herself. Too much. This was all too much.

_All that's waiting is regret_

"I can't believe this," his voice but a strained, hoarse whisper.

"Eli—" Clare began, only for her throat to tighten. How else could she end that sentence? _'This isn't what it looks like?' 'It's not what you think?'_ Eli deserved more than the trite, worn-out clichés she could only hope to offer him in that moment.

He wouldn't look at her. That seemed to be the thing which hurt the most. Not even the old, hateful memories that came piling in just earlier at the door hurt as much as this. Eli's eyes never stayed trained on any one spot in the oppressive room for long. Shaking his head, fingers clenching, pulling at his hair atop his head, he muttered over and over and _over_: "I can't. I can't believe this."

Finally, Fitz spoke up. "Eli, I only came to—"

"To _what?"_ Eli bellowed. Perhaps it was because Mark just merely stood there with an almost sad expression on his face, or perhaps it was only a matter of time, for Eli's fear, it seemed, had given way completely to his incredulous rage.

Clare fell into herself but still Eli continued pacing, his hands compressed into fists at his side. "You come here out of the blue when Clare here is finally—" He gestured toward her, his hand all encompassing her existing deplorable state "-fucking _finally_ over your worthless, sorry ass expecting…what exactly?" He couldn't help but ask rhetorically.

Clare winced at his emotion, raw, hung out there for everyone to see, remembering she herself had done the same thing when she realized who it was at her door. Feeling helpless and small, not for the first time this evening, she bit her lip.

"Cheap approval?" Eli ventured a guess, his usual pleasantly sarcastic tenor turned instead to a now bitter snarl. "Some twisted, contemptible form of_ redemption? Or—" _Eli's presumptions seemed never ending._ "_More likely, one last good fuck?"

At the final, Clare flinched. Eli, however, glared down Fitz. In his eyes, Mark's motives remained unclear, shadowy as the dead of night.

"No." Clare found her voice, though it broke at just the single syllable. She pushed on, forcing herself to make him see whatever…_this _was that was happening. "Eli, it's not like that."

Finally his eyes shifted to her. "Then what's it like?" His voice low, weary sounding.

Instead of answering, she gave him another question to consider. She angled her body toward his, away from Fitz, making her voice a whisper. Pleading. "Don't you think we all need a little closure in this?"

Again, silence encompassed the room. Eli heaved a sigh, the breath rattling him as he exhaled apprehensively, the line between so-called 'good' and 'bad' decisions grayer than ever.

"Yeah," he murmured in an undertone. "Yes. I guess we do."

_I've learned to live, half alive_

His words poured out, quickly, apologetically, ruefully. Never once was he interrupted out loud. His words swimming streams down through, inundating the room.

"I never meant for anyone to get hurt," Fitz spoke as Clare moved to Eli's side. She could practically feel her best friend's screaming thoughts to her in response to Mark's statement.

_But we did. _

Still Fitz ran on. "I only meant to scare you…with that knife…"

_And you did._

"I don't know what I was thinking…"

_Yes. You do._

"I just wanted things to go back to the way they were. Getting Clare back, pushing you out of the picture…"

Silence.

"You have to know I regret everything. It wasn't supposed to happen…"

_But it did._

"Every day, I wish I could change it…the night before the dance, the day of, that night…everything."

Silence.

"I-" Pause. Mark did his best to look Eli in the eye. The latter wasn't exactly obliging. "I don't expect forgiveness…Believe me, I know I don't deserve it…I just came here to apologize. I should have done it a long time ago…and I'm sorry."

Silence.

Clare reached out, clutching Eli's hand. Only then did she notice the tears streaking his face, mirroring her own. Seconds past, as noiseless as the last, until—

"Okay."

Fitz actually took a step back. "Sorry?" He hesitated; disbelief coloring his tone over the word he _thought_ came from Eli's direction.

Eli squeezed Clare's hand, his eyes never wavering from Fitz's incredulous state. "Okay."

Fitz nodded. "Thank you," he spoke earnestly.

But Eli's face remained stoic through it all, appearing not to have any more words besides that one to say. Either way, it was more than Mark could have hoped for. All three knew that.

He made his way to the door, turning as he reached it, taking in one final glance at Clare and Eli. Nodding to himself, he stepped back out, into the rain.

_I have grown too strong  
to ever fall back in your arms_


End file.
